Entries tagged with: IssueProjectRoom

Brooklyn's Issue Project Room will be closing in 2015 for renovations to its Boerum Place theater. One of the final events before it closes will be a special IPR benefit on December 9, featuring electronic duo Matmos performing scenes from Robert Ashley's groundbreaking television opera Perfect Lives which ran from 1978 - 1983. Tickets are available now for IPR members and will go on sale to the general public on Wednesday (10/22). It's Matmos' only show on their schedule. Here's a little bit more about the performance:

Perfect Lives (1978-83) is Robert Ashley's opera "about" bank robbery, cocktail lounges, geriatric love, adolescent elopement, et al, in the American Midwest. One of the definitive text-sound compositions of the late 20th century, it has been called a comic opera about reincarnation. Originally commissioned by the Kitchen in the early 80s, Ashley's Perfect Lives, the opera for television is widely considered the precursor of music-television and a masterpiece of the American vernacular. A Spanish-language adaptation of Perfect Lives, Vidas Perfectas, was commissioned by ISSUE Project Room in 2012 and later staged as part of the 2014 Whitney Biennial.

The Matmos performance even takes place just after the Kim Gordon & Loren Connors show at Issue Project Room on 12/3 with Gary War. Tickets for that show go on sale to the general public on Friday (10/24).

Anyone who came down to ISSUE Project Room on Saturday (4/26) to check out avant-garde Norwegian noise band Serena-Maneesh, expecting another loud rock show were in for a surprise. The one-off event, a part of Oslo's Ultima Festival, was the U.S. premiere of "Somnambulism," a tribute to influential electronic composer Arne Nordheim.

Accordionist Frode Haltli opened the set in the dark, church-like space, lit only by a tiny desk lamp. The audience then moved to the center of the room for Serena-Maneesh's performance, where they surrounded the band and choir in what felt like a holy ceremony. A haunting combination of electronic sounds, humming, and gong, their set also featured projections by acclaimed artist Ingrid Pop.

This was definitely not the same sort of show we've seen before from Serena-Maneesh, but the combination of sounds, art, space, and audience participation provided a reminder of why they are difficult to explain, but a wonder to experience.

More pics from the Issue Project Room "Somnambulism" performance along with the show's program (setlist), below...

As mentioned a few times, there's a benefit honoring Kim Gordon happening at Issue Project Room on November 13 and 14, and the full lineup has finally been announced. It looks like this...

On the first night (11/13), there will be a VIP reception at 7 PM which will feature Kim performing as a duo with drummer Tim Barnes (who has played with Jim O'Rourke, Silver Jews, etc), along with food and drinks by Rucola. Then at 9 PM, J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr will play a solo set, followed by Body/Head (aka Kim Gordon and Bill Nace) performing as a trio with no wave legend Ikue Mori. Tickets are available for the VIP reception and 9 PM concert ($250, but $150 tax-deductible), and also just for the 9 PM concert ($35).

Then, on night 2 (11/14), Kim will first perform as a duo with her Her Noise collaborator Jutta Koether, and will then do a trio set with I.U.D. (aka Lizzi Bougatsos of Gang Gang Dance and Sadie Laska of Growing). Tickets for night 2 are available.

The week after the Kim Gordon benefit, there's also the Body/Head show at MoMA (11/21), featuring a DJ set from Kathleen Hanna (The Julie Ruin, Le Tigre, Bikini Kill). Tickets for that show are still available, and you can also win a pair.

J Mascis just played a Brooklyn show with Speedy Ortiz last week (10/23) in celebration of Mishka's new Dinosaur Jr clothing line. Dinosaur Jr will open for MGMT at Barclays Center (12/13) (tickets), and Dinosaur's Lou Barlow will bring his other band, Sebadoh, to NYC when their tour hits Bowery Ballroom on Friday (11/1) (tickets).

Speaking of Gang Gang Dance side projects, Brian DeGraw's new solo project bEEdEEgEE will make its live debut on November 30 at Glasslands. Since we last spoke, Mas Ysa was added to that show. Tickets are still available.

We also just posted some tributes/sentiments from Kim Gordon and other Sonic Youth members to Lou Reed.

The Issue Project Room's space at 22 Boerum Place, located inside an 87-year-old former Elks Club headquarters, is one of the cooler venues in the city. The intimate room, originally designed for chamber music, is especially ideal for the sort of heady soundscapes and textural improvised music often booked there.

Plus: Amen Dunes teams with Tom Thayer on October 18, then the next night (10/19) it's William Basinski, and the night after that (10/20) has No-Neck Blues Band, plus Loren Connors & Tom Carter. And lots more. Full fest schedule is in this post.

The main focus of Kim Gordon's post-Sonic Youth career has been Body/Head, her duo with Bill Nace, who release their new album, Coming Apart, next week (9/10) via Matador (have you streamed it?). They're supporting the new album with a tour which begins with a release show in Brooklyn on the day of the album's release at Union Pool (9/10) with YOSHIMO and Noise Nomads. That show is sold out, but there's also a couple other Body/Head and Body/Head-related shows coming up in NYC after the tour ends.

First, Body/Head will perform at the New Yorker Festival, which runs from October 4-6. They play on October 5 at SIR Stage 37, and in addition to their performance, there will also be a conversation with Kim and Alex Halberstadt. Then, there will be a benefit honoring Kim at Issue Project Room on November 13 and 14. That benefit will feature Kim herself being joined by a number of past collaborators, including her Body/Head bandmate Bill Nace, no wave legend Ikue Mori (also known for collaborations with Fred Frith, Julianna Barwick, and more), Kim's Her Noise collaborator Jutta Koether, and more TBA. Tickets for the first night ($250, $150 tax-deductible) which includes a VIP reception with an intimate performance form Kim and food and drinks by Rucola, are on sale now. Tickets for the second night go on sale Thursday, September 13 ($35).

Updated Body/Head dates are listed, along with a song stream and the flyer for the IPR shows, below...

Syrian pop musician Omar Souleyman has been gaining recognition here in America thanks to some compilations/live albums on Sublime Frequencies, the live shows he's been doing here over the last few years, and his association with Bjork. Now he's set to release his first official studio album, Wenu Wenu, on October 22 via Domino affiliate Ribbon Music. The record is being produced entirely by electronic mastermind Four Tet, who is openly a fan. Check out a song from the album in a recent Four Tet mix (around the 1:57:00 mark), the album trailer, and tracklist, below.

In June 2013, ISSUE Project Room and the Goethe-Institut New York present PAN_ACT, a multi-faceted series of performances, talks, and installations exploring parallel strategies in conceptual art, underground dance, and experimental music. Curated by ISSUE Project Room's Lawrence Kumpf and Berlin-based designer and founder of the PAN label Bill Kouligas, PAN_ACT presents a diverse array of artists working in Berlin, London, Boston, and New York, drawn largely from the PAN roster. Sixteen events span multiple venues including ISSUE Project Room and the Goethe-Institut Wyoming Building, as well as collaborative presentations with MoMA PS1, The Bunker, Mutual Dreaming, Make Music New York, NPR Music, and Non-Event (Boston).

The PAN_ACT festival described above kicked off in NYC last Friday (6/14), and it's continuing through Saturday, June 29. It's already included a number of forward-thinking events throughout the week, and there's even more coming up, including...

Saturday (6/22) at 285 Kent, Resident Advisor and NYC party Mutual Dreaming are teaming up for a late show (10 PM - 4 AM) with live sets by Detroit techno vet/Juan Atkins associate Terrence Dixon and abstract hip hop collaboration Sensational & Koyxen, plus DJ sets by Berlin's Call Super and DJ Richard. Tickets for that one are available. Show flyer below.

PAN_ACT also includes the first installment of this year's Warm Up at MoMA PS1, which happens on June 29 with Juan Atkins, Lee Gamble, Heatsick, Koyxen, and Bill Kouligas. Tickets for that one are still available.

The second-annual Spy Music Festival happens June 29th through July 15th, featuring "46 sets of music at 7 venues in Manhattan and Brooklyn." That's a big expansion from last year when it took place on two nights at Shea Stadium and Zebulon. This year's fest, run by the folks at Northern Spy Records, will happen at Union Pool, the Issue Project Room, The Stone, Vaudeville Park, 285 Kent, Death by Audio and Roulette. Amongst the artists performing are Rhys Chatham, Matthew Shipp, Dustin Wong, Arthur Doyle, Eugene Chadbourne, PG Six, Guardian Alien and Magik Markers.

The full Spy Music Festival schedule -- bands, venues, prices -- is below. There's no all-inclusive festival pass, but tickets to all the shows are available here. And the fest organizers have also made a sampler featuring the artists performing this year and you can stream that below as well.

"For three intimate evenings, Philip Glass comes to ISSUE Project Room, New York's City's only European Chamber Music Hall. His only performance in Brooklyn this year, "Philip Glass: Music With Friends" is a rare occasion featuring Glass in duo performances with Laurie Anderson [6/15] and Stephin Merritt of the Magnetic Fields [6/13], as well former ISSUE Artists-in Residence Tristan Perich [6/14], Ryan Sawyer [6/15], and Nate Wooley [6/13]. The full artist roster will be announced soon, under 200 seats will be sold for each performance."

Legendary pianist and poet Cecil Taylor is one of the greatest improvisers in the history of modern jazz. Since the first performances of his quartet at the Five Spot Café in 1956, he has unflinchingly and tirelessly worked to define a sound that is still light years ahead of its time. His playing has been called fierce, constructivist, percussive, and atonal. We call it a thing of beauty, an expression of pure genius.

ISSUE Project Room and Harlem Stage, in partnership with Anthology Film Archives and the Jazz Studies Department of Columbia University, are proud to present a month-long celebration of the great maestro Cecil Taylor, featuring a range of performances, readings, conversations and screenings as well as two extremely rare performances by Cecil Taylor himself at Harlem Stage and ISSUE Project Room.

Limited tickets just went on sale for the Issue Project Room show, and Harlem Stage tickets are on sale too (May 8 & May 9).

On April 21, the night after Vaura plays, Toby Driver (who is a member of Vaura and also fronts Kayo Dot/maudlin of the Well) will present the world premiere of his new trio, Ichneumonidae, which includes violinist Timba Harris (of Secret Cheifs 3) and Michelle Morinaga. That same night, Toby also plays as a member of Stern with Chuck Stern, Keith Abrams, and Tim Byrnes.

As mentioned, Kayo Dot, Vaura, and Dysrhythmia share a bill at DBA on 4/28.

Speaking of Mick Barr, his music and William Brittelle's music will be performed by ACME: American Contemporary Music Ensemble on May 11 at 12 at The Kitchen. ACME players for this concert are Caleb Burhans (violin, banjo, and voice), Clarice Jensen (cello), Eric Lamb (flute), Megan Levin (harp), Caroline Shaw (violin), Nadia Sirota (viola) and Chris Thompson (percussion). Tickets are on sale now.

Speaking of Hunter Hunt-Hendrix, he kicks off a residency at Issue Project Room on Saturday (4/14) with Liturgy bandmate Bernhard Gann. The show is free but "sold out". Other dates in the "3-month residency" have not been announced yet but presumably will be soon.

"Why can't we play facing this way?" Thurston Moore asked during his February 2nd acoustic, solo concert at New York's Allen Room, turning from the audience and gazing through the floor-to-ceiling glass behind his band. In fact, he did. Halfway through "Ono Soul," from his 1995 album Psychic Hearts, the Sonic Youth guitarist swung around toward the winter's-night view across Central Park, holding his instrument over his head, then aiming it at his small amp like a divining rod, drawing out a broad drone of distortion." [Rolling Stone]

Watch a video from the NYC show below (of Thurston playing and reciting poetry), and check out the pictures from Austin.

Filmmaker Jim Jarmusch and Dutch composer Jozef Van Wissemteamed up for an album titled Concerning The Entrance Into Eternity (due out 2/28 via Important Records) and performed in support of it at Issue Project Room earlier this month (2/3). The performance, like the album, features Jarmusch on guitar and Van Vissem on lute. A video from it is below.

The two will team up again for another NYC show which happens at Le Poisson Rouge on March 5. That show is with Matteah Baim and a Drag City-signed special guest. Tickets are on sale now.

In other Jim Jarmusch news, he's featured on the new 15-minute Fucked Up single, along with Austra and Annie-Claude Deschênes, which you can listen to HERE.

Philip Glass isn't the only 20th-century composer with a big birthday this year. Avant-garde composer John Cage would've been 100, and there are numerous chances to see his work (even more than usual) because of it. The shows below cover quite a bit of ground--eg. 1940's "Living Room Music" on the same program as 1991's "Four3"--and the best place to experience the pieces is definitely in a group.

Avant Music Festival, happening February 10-18 at Wild Project (195 E 3rd St at Ave B), explores the work of Cage at several shows. There's an afternoon/evening program on Saturday, February 11th, which includes a 4pm performance by Bang on a Can's Vicky Chow of Cage's "Sonatas and Interludes" for prepared piano, followed by a longer evening set. Tickets are on sale.

New music quartet loadbang performs as part of that Avant Music show, and will also presents an Evening of John Cage on Thursday, March 8th at Greenwich House Music School.

Issue Project Room, which just moved into a new home, has some Cage-related shows coming up, such as Stephen Drury playing his "Etudes australes" on February 24 and "On Silence: Hommage to John Cage" which features 13 new pieces that are all 4 minutes, 33 seconds long.

So Percussion hosts "We Are All Going In Different Directions--A John Cage Celebration" at Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall on March 26th. They'll be performing Cage's music, as well as that of Matmos and Cenk Ergün (who should be appearing) and Dan Deacon's "Bottles." Tickets are on sale.

It's the last stop in a Cage-dedicated tour, which also visits Boston, Toronto and Austin (info below). On March 27th, recordings from the tour will be released by Cantaloupe Records as Cage 100: The Bootleg Series, a limited-edition package with a blank 4'33" LP, a CD of "tracks chosen by chance operations" and a full archive of the shows online.

Also part of that is John Cage Unbound--A Living Archive, an online project through New York Public Library, which is going to collect performances and talks of Cage's work by musicians and students (and user-submitted videos). It's also going to have an archive of scores, photographs and other artifacts. Two videos from that--one of pianist Margaret Leng Tan showing you how to prepare a piano, and one with So Percussion crumpling paper (they love to do that)--are below.

Check out more videos, including 4' 33" performed by an orchestra, Andrew W.K. and a wall, below...

"Any Jim Jarmusch buff could tell you that the man has great taste in music. Take the original scores for Stranger than Paradise and Dead Man, by John Lurie and Neil Young, respectively--stand-alone masterpieces that mesh beautifully with the director's stark black-and-white palette--or the killer lineup (Stooges, Sleep, Raekwon) he put together for the 2010 ATP New York fest. Curating isn't the same as performing, though, and even a disciple hip to Jarmusch's stint as keyboardist for early-'80s NYC art punks the Del-Byzanteens might second-guess his current instrumental abilities.

So what a happy surprise it is that Concerning the Entrance Into Eternity (Important), a new record that pairs Jarmusch's guitar with Jozef Van Wissem's lute, is one of the young year's most engaging listens: an album that dispels within seconds any sense of a filmmaker turned dilettante musician. -[Time Out NY]

Concerning The Entrance Into Eternity is not due, via Important Records, until 2/28, but both Dutch lutanist and composer Jozef Van Wissem & Jim Jarmusch will celebrate the release with performances at Issue Project Room on February 3rd at 8PM and 10PM. Tickets for the early show appear to be sold out, but the late show is still on sale (same ticket link for both).

Check out a song from the record as well as a live set of the pair at WNYC below.

Issue Project Room will be moving into its new home at 110 Livingston Street on January 25th. To launch it, there will be a series of four shows with Dutch festival Gaudeamus Muziekweek. Those nights will include, among other things, a performance of Gyorgy Ligeti's "Poème Symphonique" for 100 metronomes and sets by the Wet Ink Ensemble and International Contemporary Ensemble.

Before that though, the folks at Issue will be closing out the Old American Can Factory room with a concert tonight (Friday, January 20th). That'll feature Jonathan Kane's February, Talibam! and MV Carbon & Tony Conrad. Jonathan Kane's February will also use the occasion to release a live album recorded at the space. Listen to a sample from that at the Free Music Archive. Tickets are on sale.

The New York Times reports that there is some work to be done by the group, which is $1.3 million short of its total construction budget. Still, moving in is a huge step. It's been four years since they first announced the new venue, and it'll be interesting to see how the space evolves.

Upcoming shows in the new theater include: Jozef Van Wissem and Jim Jarmusch playing a release show for their collaborative album Concerning the Entrance into Eternity (tickets), Title TK (the trio of Howie Chen, Cory Arcangel and Alan Licht) on February 11th (tickets) and a reading with Thurston Moore and his poetry publishing company Flowers & Cream on February 23rd (tickets).

Listen to a clip of Van Wissem/Jarmusch playing from the new album on WNYC's New Sounds live, below. There are also videos from two performances that already happened at the the gorgeous 110 Livingston Space...

On 11/11/11, for their third and final installment of their artist residency, Prince Rama will herald in the end of the world by way of karaoke. Using the number one hit singles corresponding with the dates of eleven different predicted "apocalypses" such as Heavens Gate, Jonestown, and Y2K, they will "chop and screw" the songs to a point beyond recognition and invite anyone who wishes to participate to perform the resulting pieces. -[Issue Project Room]

Prince Rama kicked off a tour with Indian Jewelry one day later (on 11/12) at Cameo in Brooklyn. Prince Rama play Brooklyn again at Glasslands on February 23rd, though knowing them they'll play before then too. Before then they'll also visit Australia and many other places.

All tour dates, more pictures from possibly the world's first apolayptic karaoke party, and the band's new video for "Golden Silence", below...

When William Basinski opened his nightclub Arcadia in 1992, Williamsburg had more than a decade of history as an outerborough artists' colony. Arcadia and a handful of other entities such as The Lizard's Tail, Lalalandia, Test-Site gallery, Nerve Circle Studios, Mustard and Galapagos transformed the artists' colony into a full blown urban subculture. No neighborhood in Brooklyn compares to Williamsburg for the shrillness of her declaration of artistic autonomy in the closing years of the last century. This neighborhood is the heart of the Brooklyn Renaissance. And at the heart of Williamsburg, in the pivotal years, was Arcadia. Join us on November 2nd, as we pay tribute to William Basinski and create the distinctive environment and spirited performances of Arcadia at 110 Livingston Street, our future home.
- Issue Project Room

Bovary? A tango for Anna Karenina? Every title, author and genre is fodder for songs written and performed by local musicians including Corn Mo, Phoebe Kreutz, Franz Nicolay, Sweet Soubrette, Dan and Rachel and Natti Vogel, inspired by Keith Richards' autobiography. Hosted by Susan Hwang.

Prince Rama are set to release their upcoming LPTrust Now on October 4 via Paw Tracks. You can grab the album track "Rest In Peace" above. Prince Rama are also putting out karaoke videos leading up to the album's release with other artists singing tracks off the new album. You can check out videos of G Lucas Crane of Woods singing "Incarnation" and Janka Nabay singing "Summer of Love" below.

They'll tour in support of the album opening for the equally otherworldly Gang Gang Dance on their GGD's previously announced tour. It hasn't been revealed if Prince Rama open GGD's October 22 Bowery Ballroom show during CMJ (which tickets are still on sale for), but Prince Rama's dates do list a CMJ show that day.

As mentioned, Prince Rama also have a residency at Issue Project Room scheduled. That residency includes a show on Thursday (9/8) at the Brooklyn venue. Admission is free and RSVP is open. According to Issue Project Room's site:

2011 Artist-in-Residence Prince Rama will transform ISSUE Project Room into a point of origins. They will construct a "sacred space" using gathered matter from off-site urban wilds of Brooklyn. Audience members will be invited to build their own instruments and utilize them in an extended jam session open to anyone who wishes to attend (regardless of musical skill). This aims to investigate the utopian symbology of "the jam session" as a poetic reenactment and microcosmic creation of an ideal democratic society. Cut off from the rest of the world, yet wholly imbedded within it, this ritual space becomes a NO PLACE.

Prince Rama have also been added to the Javelin show at 285 Kent, which is happening on September 17. The Amil Byleckie Band are also on the bill. More details on this show are below.

As mentioned, Panda Bear plays Brooklyn Masonic Temple on October 2. We also mentioned that the show would reportedly be taking place one day after another NYC show that would probably be at Webster Hall. It's since been confirmed that the other show will take place on October 1 at Webster Hall. Tickets go on sale Friday (8/26) at noon for the Webster show and the Masonic Temple show. An AmEx presale for the Webster Hall show starts Wednesday (8/24) at noon.

An image from Robert Longo's Pictures for Music (1979), which will be played alongside Rhys Chatham's Guitar Trio...

Since 1993 the record label Table of the Elements has staked its claim on a massive enterprise, intending nothing less than to rewrite the history of American music in the second half of the 20th century, and beyond. Its projects have focused on musicians whose light shimmers outside the frames of convention, and comprise a vital contemporary archive of experimental, minimalist, improvised and outsider musics.

"Sunn O))) is on a break. We've been so for about a year now. We did a lot from 2007 to last year. Five tours supporting the album, a hundred shows in a single year I think, which is a lot. We don't really want to become a touring band. Greg said something really funny about it once: 'We're not gonna turn into High on Fire!'. Sunn O))) focuses on irregularity, so when you're taking the irregularity from it, you're kind of sabotaging it. But we're curating a line-up in April at Roadburn festival in Holland, though. We've got Winter playing, Keiji Haino, Corrosion of Conformity, Trap Them, and a bunch of death metal bands. It's going to be amazing, actually, a real mix of old and new acts. We'll be playing too, of course." - Stephen O'Malley:

The above quote comes from a recent interview with Stephen O'Malley done by The Quietus. And while O'Malley doesn't have any current US dates with sunn O))), he DOES have solo dates scheduled including one in Pennsylvania and one on May 14th at Issue Project Room in Brooklyn.

The NYC show is the third night of "the final" Table of The Elements Festival where Stephen will share a bill with Jonathan Kane's February, Helen Money, and Igor Cubrilovic. Stephen describes his solo set as "Primitive, minimal & loud guitar." Mission of Burma's Roger Milleralso told us earlier this year that his M2 project would be playing the same fest. Stay tuned for more details (the venue is currently not listing it yet).

Stephen O'Malley recently dropped an LP as part of Aethenor, his project with Daniel O'Sullivan (Ulver, Mothlite, Guapo), Kristoffer Rygg (Ulver) and Steve Noble (N.E.W., Company, etc.). Stream portions of En Form For Bla on the Midheaven distro site.

If you've got some extra cash lying around, want to give to a good cause, want to help Elliot Sharp celebrate his 60th birthday in a very special way, and don't already have a ticket, note: limited VIP tickets will be available at the door of tonight's E#@60 event at Issue Project Room's 110 Livingston space. If you can't make it to the BrooklynVegan-sponsored shindig but you're free Saturday, grab a ticket now for the second part of the celebration which goes down at the (OA) Can Factory.